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The 4th of July has come and gone. The explosion of things in Major League Baseball continues as we are looking at one of the better seasons we’ve seen in a while. Last week, until the All-Star game … here we go!

(Photo by Otto Greule Jr/Getty Images)

Top 6
1. Red Sox – league-leading 54 wins and the only AL team playing .600 baseball. Yeah, they’re still very good!
2. Pirates – tied for first in the NL Central. I am still amazed. The only team in the bigs to not give up 300 runs yet.
3. Cardinals – I wonder how worried they are about the Pirates. They own baseball’s best run differential at +122. That’s 80 runs better than Pittsburgh.
4. Oakland – I don’t need to ask if the Texas Rangers are worried about them. They are. This is a playoff team again.
5. Reds – one of four 50 win teams in the NL. Still stuck in 3rd place. They need to be better on the road (20-22).
6. Rangers – last year they lost a huge lead and eventually the AL West. This year, they will fight for it every day of the second half.

4 stats
1. 11 of the 14 teams above .500 have scored at least 350 runs. The Pirates, Yankees and Nationals have not. There are seven teams with losing records that have scored at least 350 runs, including the Padres, Twins and Cubs.
2. Chris Davis has 33 HRs and 85 RBIs through 88 games this year. Through all of last season when he played 139 games, he finishes with 33 HRs and 85 RBIs.
3. The Pirates have some of the best pitching in the league. But their bullpen deserves a lot of credit. Their starters have thrown just 39 quality starts (24th in MLB). Their bullpen ERA is 2.91, second best in the game, while throwing the second most bullpen innings.
4. It’s been a rough week for the Orioles offense. just 20 runs (3rd fewest in MLB), .212 batting average (4th worst in MLB) and .626 OPS (5th lowest in MLB).

Bottom 3
1. Astros – back where they belong as the worst team in the league. 2-8 over their last 10.
2. Marlins – the only team who has yet to score 300 runs. At 283, it could take them a whole week to break 300.
3. Brewers – Ron Roenicke admitted sometimes even he can’t watch his team play. ‘Nuff said.